After half the Bengals team traded their black and orange unis and their diamond-studded bling for solid orange jumpsuits and a pair of steel bracelets, and Adam “Pacman” Jones decided that he didn’t need a weatherman to make it rain, I didn’t think it could get any worse for the NFL or its image.
But what Michael Vick has been accused of doing tops them all.
Atlanta’s star running, er, quarterback has been pinned squarely in the center of a wide-reaching dogfighting ring run out of his home in Georgia. The authorities involved believe they have struck the mother lode. Athletes have been connected to these sorts of rings before, but never one with such status as Vick. Former Trail Blazer Qyntel Woods pleaded guilty to first degree animal cruelty charges stemming from cases brought forth in 2004.
Nothing has been proven yet, and no charges have been brought, but the evidence is both plentiful and damning.
According to George Dohrmann in an article on Sportsillustrated.com, several pieces of dogfighting paraphernalia, including something called a “rape stand” – used to restrain aggressive dogs for breeding purposes – have been found in Vick’s Virginia home.
If it is true, then this is worse than the litany of Bengals arrests, it is worse than Pacman’s late-night antics, it’s worse than the Titans’ Albert Haynesworth stomping on the head of unhelmeted Cowboys center Andre Goudre. It is the most slimy, sickening, gut-wrenching, heartless, unconscionable act of cowardice ever perpetrated by a professional athlete.
Here’s why: What Vick has allegedly done is breed these pit bulls, otherwise capable of being gentle and loving, for no other purpose than to later watch them rip into each others’ throats for hours on end with the inevitable result being death, either by a shotgun blast outside of the dogfighting arena or through a more merciful injection of euthanasia when it is determined the dog can no longer fight.
Even worse, money is allegedly bet on these dogs. Not a couple of hundred dollars, either. As reported by Dohrmann, among others, a source familiar with Vick and what goes on at his house says that Vick was “one of the heavyweights” of dogfighting and that sometimes the purses surrounding the fights reach as high as $10,000.
That Michael Vick, or anybody for that matter, can raise a dog from a puppy and turn it into a killing machine is beyond my comprehension. That he can keep a dog fed, healthy and strong for the months or years until it reaches prime fighting age tells me that something about this man is simply not human. I refuse to believe a person with feelings and a soul could watch such a grizzly scene even once and repeat those actions later.
If it turns out that it is all true and Vick has been raising dogs specifically to fight – and later to die – then Commissioner Roger Goodell needs to act. Fast.
Goodell needs to make an example of Vick, not just for other NFLers, but for all pro athletes. He needs to give him more than the half-season suspension he gave Bengals’ wide receiver Chris Henry, more than the year he gave Jones.
He needs to do to Vick’s sorry excuse for a career the same thing that eventually happens to the dogs who can no longer fight. He needs to put it out of its misery.
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